


A Meeting in a Field

by 100demons



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Developing Relationship, M/M, Post-Canon, Relationship Negotiation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-06
Updated: 2016-02-06
Packaged: 2018-05-18 12:24:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5928247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/100demons/pseuds/100demons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I think you, of all people, would understand that what you want and what you need to do are two completely different things,” Adam said quietly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Meeting in a Field

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Liviania](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liviania/gifts).



“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing  
and rightdoing there is a field.  
I'll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass  
the world is too full to talk about.”

Rumi

 

* * *

 

Sometime during the train ride, it had begun raining heavily. Adam peered up at the sky under his lashes, tucked away in the sheltered corner of the subway staircase leading up above ground. Several bundled up commuters skirted around him with an irritable air, their sodden shoulders brushing against his. He uselessly patted his coat pockets, knowing anyway that he didn’t carry an umbrella with him.

His phone buzzed sharply, once, twice. Adam fished it out with careful fingers, catching sight of a brief flicker of _You’re late. I’ve been waiting for the past ten minutes. I don’t have time for this._

Adam’s mouth curved into a faint smile as he put his phone away.

“Move it,” a small girl snapped at him as she roughly pushed past him and up the stairs, her lashes clumpy with too much mascara, the corners of her eyes smudged with runny eyeliner. She looked about sixteen, her fingernails bitten down to the quick and covered in chipped purple nail polish.

Briefly, Adam caught a phantom flash of Blue-at-sixteen, her hair sticking up at half a dozen different places, eyes narrowed in fury at something Ronan-at-seventeen had said. But it faded away as he watched the girl clamber up the stairs, fumbling with the hood of her over-sized jacket, the faint resemblance dissolving into the wet, gray ether.

“Pardon,” Adam murmured reflexively, as he pulled his coat collar up tight against his throat, and followed her up and into the rain. He snagged a stack of AM New York papers lying by the top of the stairs and held it over his head as a futile shield; it grew wet and soggy before he even managed to cross a street, but he perversely clung to it, rebuffing the attempts of several men trying to hawk shit plastic umbrellas.

His coat pocket vibrated insistently several times more as he waited by the edge of the crosswalk, waiting for the light to turn in his favor. Across the street, a man also holding a stack of newspapers over his head exchanged a slight nod of solidarity with Adam, the runny newsprint ink staining the edge of his white cuff.

By the time he reached the front of the deli, Adam’s coat was nearly soaked entirely through and the stack of papers had almost disintegrated in his hand. His phone had also not stopped vibrating.

He slipped through the door, dodging the line of people waiting to order egg sandwiches and coffee, and headed towards the seating area in the back. There was only one person sitting in the corner, shoulders hunched over a large coffee and a bagel still wrapped up in wax paper. He was typing furiously away at a phone, occasionally reaching up with an hand to touch the Bluetooth piece fitted in one ear.

“Good morning,” Adam said, sliding into the opposite seat, unceremoniously dumping the wet papers and coat onto the chair next to him.

Declan’s head jerked up, hard, surprise and annoyance flitting briefly over his face before he managed to slide an immovable mask over his features. “I see you’ve finally made it,” he said, attempting a cool tone.

“Yes,” Adam agreed, reaching out to grab the bagel. Declan made no move to stop him, still pretending that he was typing something important and business-related on his phone. Adam let him have that small lie, even though he could clearly see the way Declan’s thumbs were following the same, rhythmic pattern, likely typing _fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck_ over and over again in a text message box addressed to himself.

“I rescheduled an appointment for this,” Declan continued, in that same too-smooth voice. “I was supposed to be meeting with a VP from Credit Suisse.”

“Hm, really,” Adam said, unwrapping the wax paper, revealing a plain bagel, toasted, covered in a vegetable cream cheese spread just the way he liked it. He took a large bite, wiping his mouth with a crumpled paper napkin that he fished out from his pants pocket, still linty in the corners.

“Gonna miss this,” he mumbled after swallowing. “Don’t think they make them quite like this back home.”

There was a sharp snap as Declan slammed his phone down onto the table, loud enough that one of the workers coming through gave the both of them a deeply suspicious look. Declan shot him an arrogant, dismissive sneer that heightened the resemblance to Ronan he normally tried to suppress, the edge of his hard Lynch mouth razor-sharp.

“That’ll be the third phone this month if you’re not more careful with it,” Adam observed in between bites of his bagel, the familiar part in the back of brain adding up expenses, hours worked, the terrifying fear of looking out over the edge of the cliff with nothing but a too-thin wallet serving as a guardrail.

Declan turned his gaze back to Adam, wrangling his features into something cold and controlled. “I fail to understand why exactly you’re giving up this--” He made a quick, circular gesture with his fingers, implying the great expanse of the city beyond the walls of the narrow, dingy little deli. “--for _Henrietta_ of all places. If I recall correctly, _leaving_ was one of your fondest wishes, before.”

Adam swiped the coffee too, washing the bagel down with the kind of black, bitter brew Declan claimed to prefer, but only drank because he liked the self-denial, liked the idea of a man who drank unadulterated pisswater.

“This is disgusting.” Adam made a face.

“Parrish.”

Adam looked up, catching the cracks spidering through the surface of Declan’s mask, uncertainty and fury revealing itself in the way he had his hands clenched, to hide the trembling.

“I think you, of all people, would understand that what you want and what you need to do are two completely different things,” Adam said quietly. “Whether I like it or not, Henrietta is home.”

This time, it was Declan who looked away.

There was a short, taut silence, the empty spaces between their bodies filled in by the bustle of the deli counter, the chime of bells ringing as orders were rung up and delivered.

“At least let me buy your plane ticket back,” Declan said.

“No,” Adam said instantly.

“Damn it, Parrish,” Delcan hissed. “Let me-- let me-- Adam, please.” His voice wavered and broke on the last word, and he flushed heavily at the sign of vulnerability.

“You've already covered breakfast,” Adam said lightly, but he reached out to clasp one of Declan’s tight fists, uncurling the white fingers so they could wrap around his own.

“I don’t want your money.”

Declan’s nostrils flared and he opened his mouth to argue. Adam cut him off with a sharp shake of his head. “Let me finish. I don’t want your money and so it won’t buy me-- buy this relationship with you. When I come back, I want it to be on my terms, my own decision.”

There was a pause and then: “When?”

Adam gave him a small smile. “When,” he repeated and squeezed tight. “But I have to go back, take care of some business. Say hello to Blue and visit some old buried friends.”

“And Ronan,” Declan added, with a hint of distate.

“I’d like to think so, yeah,” Adam said, a touch amused. He ran his free hand through his still-damp hair. Water droplets fell and splattered onto the tabletop and their clasped hands, a sudden shock against the warmth of their shared heat.

“But I’ll come back.”

Declan’s mouth curled up in a real smile, nothing like the brilliantly polished false ones he wore to impress important men in tailored suits and women with perfectly coiffed hair; this one was small and fragile and just for Adam.

“I’ll be waiting,” he said simply.


End file.
